What happened to Mark Kerr? The Smashing Machine true story

The film is set between 1997 and 2000 and charts Kerr's career as he reaches the peak of his sporting career while also dealing with numerous hardships in his personal life, with Emily Blunt starring as his then-girlfriend Dawn Staples.

But how much of the story is true and what happened to Mark Kerr after the events of the film? Read on for everything you need to know.

What happened to Mark Kerr? The Smashing Machine true story

The film is based on the 2002 documentary The Smashing Machine: The Life and Times of Extreme Fighter Mark Kerr, directed by John Hyams – and for the most part serves as a fairly accurate account of Kerr's life in the late '90s.

Throughout the film, we watch as Kerr enjoys great professional success as a Mixed Martial Artist, but arguably at the expense of his own personal life, as he deals with a number of mental health problems, substance abuse issues, and a toxic relationship with his girlfriend Dawn Staples.

The film culminates at the finals of the 2000 PRIDE Fighting Championship in Japan, where we see him beaten by the Japanese fighter Kazuyuki Fujita – a result which measures up with the events as they happened in real life.

Kerr's professional loss is offset by the fact that he has made significant progress in overcoming his addiction issues and fixed his relationship with Staples. This also more or less measures up to real events – Kerr went on to marry Staples in 2000, although they are no longer together.

It's also true that while the timeline is slightly changed for the film, Kerr eventually managed to overcome his addiction issues, and in an interview earlier this year he explained that he was now seven years sober.

"That took me a minute, because that's a reckoning," he explained while speaking to TIME. "I recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of body and mind."

After the events of the film, Kerr continued to fight for several more years, although didn't quite reach the heights of his earlier career success. He retired in 2009 and is now regarded as a pioneer in MMA, a key figure in helping to popularise the game.

Speaking to Indiewire recently, Kerr explained how he never wanted the film to shy away from showing the darker sides of his life.

“It’s a story about the human condition, good, bad, and indifferent," he told the publication. "Dwayne, Emily, and Benny all embrace those complexities and wanted to bring them all out."

The Smashing Machine is now showing in UK cinemas.

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